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Effective Drug Rehabilitation Opposes Prescribed Heroin Trial in Canada
The Canadian government approves and pays for a clinical trial to give heroin and methadone to over 400 addicts.
The North American Opiate Medication Initiative (NAOMI) began this week enrolling heroin addicts into a clinical trial that will give them more heroin, and it is funded by the Canadian Government. NAOMI received $8.1 million for the trial from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.
The study will last approximately 24 months including recruitment and administration and it will enlist participants in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal. Half of the participants will be given methadone, which is a synthetic opiate that has caused an increasing number of deaths in the U.S., and the other half will be given pharmaceutical-grade heroin. It is a tactic which the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) is also adamantly against.
Vancouver has recently been under scrutiny for its first government-protected 'safe' injection house, where heroin addicts were given a supervised place to shoot up.
While NAOMI claims that all of the participants will be transitioned at the end of the study to either methadone maintenance or some other form of treatment, the basis for the trial is a harm reduction approach, which adopts a defeatism viewpoint when it comes to rehabilitating addicts. According to the Harm Reduction Coalition those who adhere to this frame of mind seek to only minimize the effects of drug use on society instead of seeking to eradicate drug abuse all together.
According to Gary W. Smith, C.C.D.C. and CEO of Narconon Arrowhead, which is one of America's largest and most successful drug rehabilitation and education programs, "All you have to do is look at history to know that legalizing heroin for addicts will not stop drug addiction. Other countries have tried this and all that happened is they wound up with an increasing number heroin addicts that were unemployable and who faced numerous drug related health care issues that required more federal and state monies to support."
The Narconon® Program has helped thousands of addicts over the last 38 years beat their addiction through the use of its rehabilitation methods researched and developed by American author and humanitarian, L. Ron Hubbard. In addition to an effective method of drug-free withdrawal from addictive drugs, the program also uses a unique and effective sauna detoxification procedure to eliminate physical cravings and a series of life skills courses to help addicts regain control over their lives.
Methadone Deaths Rising in the U.S.
Methadone use has increased in pain management and drug replacement therapy for addicts despite hundreds of people dying each year from black market use.
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration's Drug Abuse Warning Network reported that more than 10,000 people turned up in emergency rooms after having abused methadone in 2001, which is double the number from just two years earlier.
Reported deaths from methadone abuse are rising in North Carolina, Florida, West Virginia, Maryland, Montana and Nevada while it has become the deadliest drug in Oregon according to state medical examiners. Meanwhile, profits for the drug's manufacturer and dispensers have increased dramatically as well.
Methadone was developed by German chemists as a painkiller during World War II and has been widely used as drug replacement therapy to get addicts off heroin and other opiates. There are currently more than 1,200 facilities that dispense methadone to addicts, totaling approximately 200,000 patients. While methadone may not produce the same high as heroin or Oxycontin, it is more physically addictive and more difficult to withdraw from.
The Drug Abuse Treatment Outcome Studies (DATOS) issued a report on a multi-city study of status of patients before and after various types of treatment, including outpatient methadone treatment. Results of this study that was done in the 90's show that there was actually a slight increase in heavy alcohol use and only a minimal decrease in the percentage of patients not being employed full-time and suicidal ideation.
Perhaps the most obviously overlooked flaw in this type of treatment is that the patients are still on drugs, and this cannot be considered rehabilitation.
According to J.J., a 30 year-old former heroin addict from Michigan, "I was on methadone for 5 years and it was much harder to get off than the heroin. You can't skip a day going to the [methadone] clinic or you immediately get really sick. It's a trap either way."
He has since become drug-free through the Narconon Arrowhead program, which consists of a uniquely effective withdrawal phase, confront and communication exercises, a dry heat sauna detoxification program that rids the body of physical drug cravings and a series of life skills courses to not only fully rehabilitate individuals but also to prepare them for life after drugs.
This comprehensive treatment approach was researched and developed by American author and humanitarian L. Ron Hubbard and this drug-free methodology is the reason for Narconon Arrowhead's high rate for successful recovery.
